"Some souls do not need a long time to dwell in you… it is enough to see them tremble for your sake, to realize that life is worth it."
From Kain's thoughts
✦ From Alice Cullen's perspective ✦
The sky was raining lightly with lightning, as if nature was preparing for what is coming, warning the hearts that tonight will not be like the others. We were playing baseball, that game we practice whenever thunder rises in the skies of Forks… the game that grants us almost natural moments in the middle of an unnatural world.
Rosalie's sharp laughter, Emmett's powerful leaps, and Jasper's graceful moves were filling the place… until a moment. One single moment, I felt it.
I froze. I screamed: "Stop!" I did not wait for anyone to ask, they knew what my visions meant.
Everyone turned towards me, and my eyes were staring at the fog coming from between the trees. A vision unlike any other, mixed with awe and mystery.
Edward read my thoughts in the blink of an eye, and turned his head toward Bella who was standing beside Kain. His look instantly transformed into caution, then fear, then defense. He stood in front of her, trying to hide her from the coming noses… but he was not alone. Kain was standing firmly, his look did not foretell any good. He did not move, did not panic, rather on the contrary… he looked as if he expected everything that was going to happen.
I remembered his words to me one day, when I was pressing him to explain to me his strange visions. He said: "I do not see the future like you do, but I see it in one line… fixed… long." I did not fully understand him back then, but now… I believe him.
From the fog came out the three of them. James, Laurent, and Victoria. Their calm looks did not deceive me, something in their steps was warning of danger. Something primitive inside me whispered fear.
Carlisle stepped forward, trying to speak, to calm the situation, but James stopped. He sniffed the air. My throat dried. His gaze turned toward Bella, but before he uttered a word… a flash.
A flash of lightning, I do not know where it came from, I barely saw it. As if time stopped for a moment.
Then… Kain was behind him.
And James's head was on the ground.
Seconds of silence passed. Everyone froze. No one understood. Even the air seemed to be holding its breath.
We did not move, even Laurent… he was frozen, then stepped back, and Kain rushed towards him, they exchanged blows with a speed beyond perception, another flash, and Laurent's head fell.
I was about to move, I saw Victoria about to flee, but I was late. I was not fast enough. She was faster… in the blink of an eye.
In the next moment, there was a light strike but precise that pierced Kain's heart. I screamed.
I no longer saw Victoria… only Kain.
He fell. I ran toward him.
I wished I could cry, I only wished.
He was in my lap, his body convulsing, his face pale, his wound bleeding from the chest, a red spot expanding little by little. I called his name: "Kain! No… do not do this to me… do not disappear…"
We had only seconds. I looked toward Carlisle, toward Carlaril, toward anyone who could help… no one had the solution.
Then it occurred to me…
"The venom."
Maybe… if I turned him now?
I opened my mouth, approached his neck, sank my fangs.
But… nothing. His body did not accept the venom. It did not react.
I was shocked.
Then… the impossible happened.
An aura exploded. A power… an indescribable energy.
Every cell in my body was screaming, every instinct was bowing. The ground shook, the air trembled, time itself seemed to stagger.
I no longer saw anything… except the blue light.
Then… his form changed.
Dark blue scales grew on his left side, heavy like armor, smooth like the wind. From his head grew two black horns, twisting as if carved on an ancient rock. And from his back… unfolded two giant wings, as if they were the wings of a mythical creature, from them shone sparks of blue lightning, striking the air around him.
He stood, his wound healed, his heart that Victoria had crushed… grew again.
I did not understand how, but I was happy. Just happy that he… was alive.
Then he said, in a voice unlike that of humans:
"I must pursue her… she will cause much chaos…"
He meant Victoria.
I wanted to stop him, but in a moment, he returned to his normal state… then collapsed.
He fainted.
I did not wait. I held him in my arms, placed my head on his chest, listened to his heartbeat. It was there… weak, but present.
I smiled.
He is fine.
Then, without delay, we got into the cars. Carlisle led the way toward the hospital. Carlaril had to forge the data. Kain's body was not human, his tests were extraordinary, his blood, his muscles, his cell regeneration… all of them did not resemble any human.
Charlie was devastated.
He was sitting in front of Kain's bed, looking at him as a father looks at his true son. He was truly his son… his blood of his blood, his soul raised in his heart. He did not fully understand what happened, nor how he survived, but he felt that something unnatural had happened, something too great to be explained.
A day passed. Then a week. Then a month.
And he was still asleep.
A coma without explanation.
I was by his side all the time.
I did not leave him.
I brought him books, combed his hair, contemplated his features every night, and wished… if only he would return.
In my depths, I knew.
I had loved him.
Not as I had ever loved anyone before… but as Esme, Carlisle's wife, spoke of true love, eternal, the only one.
I wished if I were faster, if I had prevented the strike, if I had taken it instead of him.
I held his hand in mine, murmured my scattered words, told him about what was happening at school, about Bella, about the news, as if I were clinging to any thread connecting me to his absent world.
And on a quiet night… after a month and a week. I was sitting beside him, my hand holding his, my head leaning on his shoulder.
I only wished… that my body could cry. But vampires do not cry.
I whispered: "If you can hear me, just give me a sign… even if you do not wake up, just… a sign."
Then, suddenly… his fingers moved.
His hand touched my cheek.
Then… in a faint, tired, but warm voice:
"Hello… Alice."
All the words that were never said poured down… and all the tears that were never shed. But I was content with a smile.
He is here.
He is back.
🌀[End of Chapter Thirteen]
✦ Next Chapter: "The Resurrection from Within… Struggle of Mind and Shadow" ✦
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